Chapter 21
TWENTY-ONE
Maren spent the quick drive to the ranch in a private argument with herself about whether she was relieved or devastated that Arden had called when she did.
Relieved, she told herself firmly. Obviously relieved.
They were in protective custody. Colin was her bodyguard.
The last thing she needed was to complicate things with a man she’d known less than a month, bodyguard or not, wound-up-like-a-spring or not, made me forget my own name when he kissed me or not.
Her phone buzzed.
Shane right behind you—don’t freak out when you see the SUV.
She glanced in the passenger mirror. Sure enough, an SUV was following them up the winding road.
She sneaked a look at Colin’s profile, the way the sunset caught the line of his jaw. He was watching the road with that easy, total attention he brought to everything. He hadn’t said much since they’d left the safehouse. Neither had she.
It’s been a perfect day, she’d said, and I’m not ready for it to end.
She’d meant it, and he’d known she meant it, and then Arden had called and Maren had spent the rest of the conversation trying to look like a normal person with a normal heart rate.
Colin pulled up to the ranch house. It was a beautiful Victorian, perfectly maintained. Shane’s SUV parked behind them. The back door opened as soon as the vehicle had fully stopped, and Juni erupted out of it with her backpack, arms already spread.
“Aunt Maren!”
Maren was out of the car before Colin had the engine fully off. She caught Juni mid-launch and swung her up, tucking her close and breathing her in. There you are. “Hey, Junebug. Did you have fun?”
“Kevin showed me how to make a whistle out of grass!” Juni demonstrated immediately, loud and piercing, directly into Maren’s ear.
“Wow.” It’s okay, I didn’t need two functioning ears anyway. Maren set Juni down.
“It took me twelve tries. Kevin said that was good for the first time.” She craned her neck back toward Shane’s SUV, where Kevin had climbed out, hands in his pockets.
Juni waved. Kevin raised a hand back, approximately two degrees above cool, which from a nine-year-old boy toward a five-year-old girl was practically a declaration of love.
Maren glanced at Colin over Juni’s head.
He had his arms folded and a look on his face like he’d noticed the same thing and was filing it away for future reference.
“Hey,” Shane said, coming around the front of his SUV.
He looked between Maren and Colin. From the way he smirked, Maren felt like she had a bright-red neon sign on her forehead reading I’d rather be scrogging Colin right now.
“Juni was great. Kevin taught her three different ways to annoy people with grass.”
“So I heard.” She pretended to clear her ear out. Maren smoothed Juni’s curls back. “What do we say to Shane and Kevin?”
“Thank you for having me.” Juni looked directly at Kevin when she said it.
Kevin’s ears went pink. “Yeah,” he said, his gaze set firmly on his shoes. “Sure.”
Shane cleared his throat. “Good night, all.” He put his hand on Kevin’s shoulder and steered him back toward the SUV with the efficiency of a father who knew when to extract his kid before things got complicated. Kevin went without protest, but he looked back once before climbing in.
Then the front door of the ranch house opened, spilling warm light out into the early evening, and Arden appeared on the porch with a welcoming smile.
“You made it. Come in, come in—I’ve been looking forward to this all day.”
Camo appeared at Arden’s side before Maren had even reached the porch steps, his big head swinging out to survey the arrivals with the calm authority of a dog who considered this his sacred duty. Then he saw Juni.
He went still for just a second, then he was down the porch steps in three unhurried strides, tail moving in long slow sweeps.
Juni made a sound that was not quite a word and went to meet him.
Camo lowered his head and she pressed her face into it, while his tail kept moving, steady as a metronome, and no one said anything for a moment.
Juni straightened up and took Camo’s face between her small hands and looked him in the eyes the way she did with people she’d decided about. “I missed you, too,” she told him, with great seriousness.
Camo thumped his tail once. Correct.
“Okay,” Arden said, before she did something embarrassing in front of everyone. “Inside, please.”
The front door opened into a short hall and small parlor to the left, and then opened again into a great room that ran almost the full width of the house, with a kitchen divided from it by a long peninsula.
A wall of windows at the back of the room faced west. The late sun had dropped behind the highest peaks and the sky above them looked gorgeous in pinks and burnt orange, the foothills rolling out below in deep purple shadow. Maren stopped walking.
“Oh,” she said.
“I know.” Arden appeared at her shoulder, smiling. “I never get tired of it. Summer evenings especially—the sun holds on for so long up here.”
The great room itself was warm and homey without trying.
A leather couch the color of dark honey occupied the center, worn soft and broken in, a throw folded over the back.
It faced a stone fireplace taking up most of one wall.
Framed photographs lined the mantel. The largest one looked familiar to Maren, not because she’d known the man in it, but because she knew the easy smile and silver-gray eyes as well as she knew her own.
Sean. My God, that’s Juni’s father.
She looked away quickly before she could get choked up.
Camo had followed Juni inside and was now stationed approximately six inches from her left side, moving when she moved. Juni accepted this as her due and was already investigating a low bookshelf near the fireplace.
“Make yourselves at home,” Arden said, pointing at a pitcher of lemonade, glasses, and a tray of crackers, cheese, and fruit on the coffee table in front of the couch.
“I have burgers in the fridge, and we can grill them as soon as Kyle gets home. He shouldn’t be too long, but have some snacks in the meantime. ”
Colin stationed himself at the far end of the peninsula with a water glass. Maren knew he was working, but it still felt so jarring. They’d been dancing no more than twenty minutes ago at most, and now he was keeping a professional distance.
Juni had settled cross-legged in front of the bookshelf with Camo pressed against her side.
She’d pulled a book of Colorado photography off the shelf and was showing it to the dog, Mr. Kibble, Snoopy, and the Blue Fairy that she’d pulled out of her backpack.
Maren took a seat on the leather couch and let herself actually look at the room—the way the last of the sunset was pouring through the back windows, the warmth of old leather, the photographs on the mantel she was carefully not looking at again.
She realized that in spite of everything she felt…safe.
“How do you do it?” she asked Arden.
“Do what?”
“Live like this.” She squeezed her eyes shut and grimaced. “Okay, I can’t seem to keep my foot out of my mouth today. Your home is beautiful. Kyle seems like a wonderful guy. You have a great life here. But…how do you sleep knowing that you have enemies who might attack you at any moment?”
Arden sighed as she gathered her thoughts. “I used to think about it a lot. A lot a lot. And I wondered what I’d gotten myself into. But if Kyle hadn’t come along, the truth is, I might not have a home at all. I might not even be alive. But he kept me safe.”
She lifted her chin in the general direction of Watchdog as she added, “They all did, and still do. The world is not a safe place and it isn’t getting any safer.
But as long as I have my home and my people who are my home, it’s okay.
I’m not afraid. I have control over this little corner of the world.
My corner. And that’s all I need. From here, I can help the people who need me.
And maybe, if I keep doing that, some goodness will spread through the darkness.
We each have our own way of spreading the light.
It’s up to us to find it. Then we have to find the courage to do it.
That’s a lot easier when you have a supportive family around you. ”
She reached for Maren’s hand. “And now you do. Sister.”
Maren looked down as she smiled, trying not to let her grateful tears fall. The Mira-shaped empty space in her heart could never be filled. But, Arden had found her way into Maren’s heart and made it feel fuller overall.
“Thank you. I can’t wait for you to meet my brothers. I know once I get a hold of them, they’ll come straight here. They adore their niece as much as I do. And, they’re going to love her father’s family.”
And dang it, there goes a tear. She quickly wiped it away.
“Tell you what,” Arden said, clapping her hands together. “You mentioned you wished you were on a Hawaiian vacation the day you got here. So, let’s lean into that vibe and have a couple of pina coladas?”
Maren giggled. “You have the makings?”
Arden was already standing up and turning toward the kitchen.
“Of course I have the makings. I live with a sailor. We have three kinds of rum. I’m sure I have a can or two of coconut cream in the pantry and I know for a fact I have pineapple rings packed in their juice and maraschino cherries because I was going to make a pineapple upside-down cake for our next book club night.
” She opened the pantry door in the kitchen.
“Oh, what are you reading?”
“It was Charlie’s turn to choose, so we’re reading a romantasy by Kat Healy.
” Arden reappeared with two cans and a bottle of rum tucked under her arm.
She set them down on the kitchen counter.
“Who knew a lumberjack bear shifter could be so hot?” she said as she fanned herself. “We call him a lumbersnack.”
Maren laughed. “Well, maybe Ellie knows?”